Can You Keep A Secret?
by Journalist793
Summary: Liv and her SIR, Pax, have been banished from the planet Irk and are left out to die. It's by mere luck when their ship crashes on Earth, but what about when they're found by Dib? Who should Liv trust in this strange new world: Dib or Zim? My first IZ fic
1. The Beginning of the End

The cold metal floor of the pod pressed against my cheek, showing about as much mercy as the shackles around my wrists were, and they were beginning to cut into my veins. I couldn't move no matter how much I wanted to, because my sense was too strong. Even the slightest movement would launch me into a world of physical pain.

But I didn't even need to move to feel that mental pain that I harbored. The horrible scene that had happened nearly seven days ago continued to replay itself in a never-ending loop. I could almost see as clearly as the day, the tall one standing before me, announcing my sentence. The words buzzed in my ears, and traveled to my eyes, where tears began to fall. Again.

"Liv, you have been accused and found guilty of hijacking a laboring SIR. Before your punishment is delivered, do you have anything to say?"

I hadn't answered. I stared at the floor, trembling, trying to fight back tears. The tall one accepted this as a "No."

"Very well. Your punishment is launched into space on a pod, where you will starve." The guy seems a little heartless, don't you think?

Well, that's what I thought as I stared some more, my magenta eyes narrowed down to slits as I was dragged away.

I looked up to see Pax put into sleep mode and being dragged after me, and I realized what that meant: I wasn't the only one who would be suffering. The almighty tallest were going to put him aboard the pod, too. I stared at the Irken soldiers who were hauling him after us, and then I asked in a soft voice, "Why are you sending Pax?"

One of them gave me a strange look. "Pax? You've named the SIR… Pax?"

"Yes," I said, nodding. My antenni dropped to frame my face as I looked at Pax being tossed around, and I could hear the gears inside of him clank against each other.

The soldiers exchanged glances before saying, "Err, the tall ones thought it best that the SIR not be returned to labor. It might spread the idea of freedom to the others. The last thing we want is a rebellion of the SIRs."

I had taken a moment to take this in. So it would be my fault that Pax would die. A wave of guilt flooded around me as two Irkens lowered me into a pod, and I landed on my side.

They opened a cabinet and laid Pax inside, his eyes dim and lifeless. "Can you take him out of sleep mode," I begged suddenly.

They looked at me like I was crazy. "Why?"

I sighed. "Company…"

None of them responded. They just shut the cabinet door that Pax lay in, and walked out, and closed the pod door. I lay in silence for nearly 15 minutes, sighing, thinking about things I could've done to change this fate. Then the floor began to rumble.

As I was lost in my memories, we passed into a meteor shower. I blankly watched the rocks roll by as they passed the window, wondering what it would be like to roam the universe as freely as those meteors. Sadly, I will never know.

Then there was a metallic thud somewhere to my left, and the whole pod began to shudder. The cabinet next to me swung open, and Pax's body rolled out, next to me.

I was shocked as I looked down at Pax, dented and grimy. My poor friend had gotten it worse than I had, and now there was little I could do to help him. But there was a lot he could do to help me.

I rolled over, feeling a surge of pain burrow into each of my limbs. I was tired and hungry, and my fingers were uncoordinated as I felt around on the back of Pax's neck, but finally, I found what I was looking for. I switched him out of sleep mode.

I could feel his warm glow behind me as his gears began to turn again. "Liv?" he asked, his voice shaky. "Mistress? Where are we?"

"I don't know, Pax," I sighed, not feeling the strength to turn back over and look at him. I moved my antenni across the floor, until I found his antenna. "Are you alright?"

"I'm fine, Liv. I've been in sleep mode. Are you alright?"

"No," I sighed. "I'm starving away. I don't think that I'll last much longer."

Pax put his arms around me like he was trying to shield me from some danger. "You're… How long have I been in sleep mode?"

"A week," I said, shaking. When Pax didn't say anything, I coughed a few times. "Do you think that you could cut through these shackles, Pax?"

Pax stood up immediately and went to my arms, his small hands grabbing at around my wrist. "Yes," he said, "but hold on. This'll hurt."

"All pain is the same to me now," I said as his eyes began to glow red, and a clean stream of heat shot towards the cuff around my wrist and cut through them, burning into my flesh. I gasped, startled by the pain.

"I'm sorry," said Pax quickly, "but it's off now. Hold on, I'll get the other." Then I felt the same pain in my other wrist. The metal hit against the floor, but I didn't move my arms. It wasn't worth the effort.

Pax walked down to the cuff on my ankles, and began to cut them away. For a few more moments, we just sat in silence, listening to the beams cut through the cuffs. I flinched again just as the cuffs fell off.

Halfway through my last ankle, Pax suddenly stood up straight, his antenna moving in strange directions over and over.

"What is it?" I asked, finally getting myself to look over at him.

Pax cocked his head to the side. "We'll be entering a change in the gravitational pull. It's… strange. A planet."

"Which one?" I asked as he pulled himself to look out a window. "Can you tell?"

"No… I've never seen it before. Not on any star charts."

"Weird," I said, looking down at my gloved hands and now scorched wrists. "How heavy is the—" but I found out just then, because the gravitational pull did indeed change. Pax and I were plastered to the pod's floor. I opened my mouth to scream, but it seemed that my voice was weighed down, too.

"Why isn't the pod's engine kicking in?" I chocked out, trying to fight the pull.

"I… don't know!" screamed Pax. "I think it's failed, they don't give that much thought to a pod of exile."

"Translation?" I asked as an air pressure began to push down on me, nearly crushing my lungs.

"Crash landing!" predicted Pax a few moments before he was proven correct.

Dib: (I'm not going to switch POVs often, this is just for dramatic affect… I can't really say much about an unconscious girl.)

My front yard was in flames. Not that I was surprised, that's usually what follows and explosion. I stared for a few moments, thinking about what this meant.

Pretty much, all I came up with was that this fire was my responsibility, because Gaz was preoccupied with her new Angry Monkey video game, and dad was in his office, trying to upgrade the toaster to becoming the new and improver "French Toaster." So that left me to care about our lives.

As I tried to pick up the pieces of my brain inside my head and stick them back together, I saw something that made me jump into action: two figures in the middle of the fire, one small one dragging a larger one away from the flames.

I gasped and turned to run for the stairs, where dad kept the fire extinguisher, and then out the door. I really didn't want to have to deal with a dead body on my property.

I pulled back the, umm, pull-thingie and a rush of foam came out of it, smothering the fire. The figures were still moving (they seemed to be going faster) as I made my way toward them.

I shot away a final wall of fire. Then I dropped the fire extinguisher; not because it was empty, more because of what I saw.

An alien. It looked… just like Zim, only different. Its legs were a little longer, making it slightly taller, but not by much. Its head was a little differently shaped with eyes a little wider than they were taller, and from its body… I could tell it was a girl.

For a few moments, I was stupefied as I stared at it. Then I realized something. "An alien," I said softly. "Actual proof."

Something rammed into me. It was a robot that looked a lot like that miserable one that Zim had. As it stood over me, its eyes began to glow, and I didn't need to be psychic to figure out that something bad was going to happen. I rolled over just as heat vision fried the spot I had lay in only a second ago.

I looked it over while it tried to recover from that, and I spotted what I needed: a switch on the back of its neck. When it turned back to me, I faked a punch and kicked him when he tried to deflect it. Then I dove in a flipped the switch. The robot shut down.

I didn't know what to do next. All I could think about was the fact that an alien ship had crashed in my front yard.

A car drove by, and I dove in front of the bodies so that no one else would see it. I wasn't about to let anyone else get this proof. It was mine; all mine.

I picked up the alien girl's body, and then the little robot, and trudged my way back to the house, struggling under the weight and regretting not going to the gym when I had had the chance.

"Dad," I called as I stood in the doorway. "An alien crashed in the front yard. Can I keep it in the basement?"

Dad was silent a moment from the kitchen before saying, "Just don't let it go on the carpet, son!"

"Kay," I said, and opened the door to the basement. Then I paused and remembered something. I turned around to grab a camera.

This was the best day of my life.

**Liv:**

It was dark, therefore I could not see. I gasped for breath as I turned my head from side to side, staring into the eternal nothingness. Was I dead?

I stood up, feeling sick to my squeedily spooch, and felt the floor. It was hard and cold.

"Pax?" I called, looking around at the blackness again. When there was no response, I panicked. "Pax? Where are you?!" I began to run. I got about 12 feet before I crashed, head first, into a wall.

"Ow," I said, falling on my back. I stared above until, a few moments later, a light flicked on. I screamed and stood up again to run.

There was a kid above me, standing on some wooden stairs. He was smiling, but not exactly the kind of "Pleased to meet you," smile. It looked more like, "Pleased to eat you." He started coming down towards me.

I backed up against the gray wall. "Don't hurt me! Please!"

He didn't exactly hurt me. He just looked at me, his smile melting away. Now he seemed just plain curious. He stared at me, not seeming to know what to say.

I dropped to me knees and looked away from the guys gaze. "If you're going to kill me, just do it now. Get it over with."

Now he seemed surprised. "I'm not going to kill you!"

I looked up, just as surprised as him. "You're… not?"

"Are you going to kill me?"

"I don't have a reason to," I said, staring up at him.

"Are you here to try to destroy the planet?" he asked me, seeming to get his guard up again.

"I don't even know what planet this is," I admitted, looking back down, then up, then down again. I couldn't make up my mind about which was better.

The boy offered his hand, as if trying to seem friendly, but he looked a little too suspicious to be friendly. "I'm Dib. Welcome to Earth."

I blinked at the strange name of the planet. The word "Earth" rolled around in my head for a second before I look his hand. "I'm Liv. I came from the planet Irk, but I…" I let myself trail off, before just saying, "I'm from Irk."

Dib furrowed his brow, as if connecting two intricate things, and opened his mouth to say something when he was interrupted.

"Dib," growled a voice from above us. "If you're planning on being here to celebrate your next birthday, you will come up here right now."

Dib seemed to take this threat seriously. "I gotta go," he said hurriedly. "I'll be back, though."

"Wait," I said as he hurried up the stairs. He turned to look at me.

I took a deep breath. "You're not going to tell anyone that I'm here, are you?"

Dib seemed to be unprepared for the question. He quivered for a moment as he reached the top of the stairs. "I… See you tomorrow." With that, he shut the door, and locked it.

**XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX**

**Hey, thanks for reading! This story took a long time to write, so I hope you liked it. Please review, I accept constructive criticism. And I'm new to this section of FF, so it would make me happy if people were to recognize my story and all. So if you could review, I will be your bestest friend, and I'll review one of your stories, if you want. Thanks, and bye. : )**

**Oh, and I'm sorry about how badly the writing came out. I'm always like this when I start a new story, but as it progresses, I promise that it'll get better and the words will come more naturally. You guys know what that's like, right? I hope. Well, that's all for now. I'll try to update soon. Thanks! **


	2. Lost and Found Out

I don't remember falling asleep, but I guess I must've, because, later that night, I woke up to be greeted by more darkness than I thought could possibly come to gather in on place. That, and... a warm, intriguing smell coming from an object very close to my face.

I was afraid to touch it at first, thinking that it might be an appealing smelling acid that, if I were to put my hand into it, it would disintegrate me. Then I began to wonder if maybe I was outside, and this was what this planet's winds felt like. Perhaps I had dreamt the whole thing after the ship crashed? Perhaps Pax and I were outside with the ship and all had turned out well for us.

I tested this theory by moving one of the antenni atop of my head. No… this was the same cold surface that I had felt before. I sighed hopelessly, scowling at myself for being foolish enough to even hope that everything was alright. To even hope that _anything_ was alright, at that. I was still a prisoner of this boy… this Dib who was keeping me down here.

Finally, curiosity found its way into my fingers, and I caught my hand inching forward to whatever it was giving off the pleasant warmth and smell. My hand closed around an object that was hard on the outside, but the inside caved easily. _How ingenious_, I thought, moving my hand around on the object. _A vulnerable, malleable substance shielding itself with an outer crust… You could win a war with something like this._ My elbow bumped against something else as I drew the object nearer to me.

I reached out my other hand, closing it around something long and narrow with coldness to it. The inside rattled when I picked it up as if it were a pod holding cargo.

Momentarily, I dropped the warm shielded device to run my hands along the glassy surface of the narrow pod. I found that one end of it stayed the same width, while the other end fanned out into a sort of head. Along its side was a switch, which I fingered for a few more moments before moving it into a different position. A beam of light came out of the larger end.

I drew back quickly, not expecting this, but did not stay in shock for long. I moved the beam around the basement until I found the crusted object again, and got a good look at it. It was a tan-ish color with ridges and a crack here or there, showing through to the white insides of it.

Beneath it was a sheet of paper with letters inked into it; strangely enough using the same characters that we had back on Irk. The note read:

_Liv,_

_I didn't want to wake you, so I left this stuff by you. I guess you've found the flashlight by the time you read this, unless you waited until morning. Anyway, I just wanted to let you know not to be scared, you impose no threat to me, so I won't be telling your secret._

_I've also left you some bread, because I figured you must be hungry. Anything else that you need, I can help you in the morning. You're safe where you are now, and I don't want you to feel like a prisoner._

_See you in the morning;_

_Dib._

I read the note over and over again, not too satisfied by what Dib had given me. He didn't mention anything about where Pax was, and, although he had assured me that I wasn't a prisoner, he never said I was free to leave.

That wasn't good enough for me. I didn't plan on sticking around until morning until I could help it. I dropped the paper and lifted the tan object, "bread" as Dib referred to it as. He had mentioned something about hunger, which I linked to the conclusion that this inspiring device was edible.

I lifted it to my lips and took a small bite of it, but as soon as it hit my taste buds, I spat it out. This was nothing compared to the rich foods of Irk! How could humans even pass this off as food?

My squeedily spooch complained again, and I felt weak from hunger. _Well_, I thought slowly, trying to lay the thought out in a neat sentence. _I suppose that anything is better than starving... _I closed my eyes and took another bite. It had not gotten any more desirable in the last 10 seconds.

II shivered and bit it again, and then again, until I was choking the entire thing down. By that time my stomach was so sick from the ghastly taste that I couldn't feel the hunger. Now hunger was looking like a blessing.

I stood up stiffly and straightened myself out, the way that a proud Irken should. Whether I liked it or not, I was now an invader here. A peaceful invader here by accident, nontheless, but still an invader.

I swept the beam of light over the room, bringing each spot it hit to life for a few moments. I skimmed over some old parts of machinery, and a chest with a lable on it that I didn't have time to read. There were some storage boxes with strings of lights spilling out, and then came an empty corner. Empty... except for a little robot that I had grown quite attached to.

I ran over to Pax's body, which had be discarded in a nook once more. His eyes were dim and lifeless, and he looked tense as if he were in the middle of a battle. I reached behind his neck and turned him on like I had done only a few times before.

The fans inside of him purred to life, and his soft blue eyes sparked on. "Liv?"

"Shhh," I said, and he looked up at me. "They could be listening," I whispered. When he only looked at me questioningly, I continued. "I'm being held down here by an Earthling, and I plan to leave. It's only best if we're gone before any proof is found that we're here. Who knows what they do to invader's here?"

Pax's eyes widened at the word "invader", it seeming to shake him. I understood why: he'd been raised from a microchip being told he would do nothing beyond make weapons. Exploring an unknown planet all on his own? That must be hard to even think about.

"Come on," I said, back up, and Pax stood up as quietly as possible, although I could still here the nuts and bolts rattling in his head. I cringed and stole a glance towards the door, wondering how advanced the hearing of these Earthlings were. Nothing was there.

I shined the flashlight alond the side of the wall, where I saw nothing new from what I had observed early. I looked over the machinery, thinking that that might help me out of here, but it was only a motor, two rusted poles, and another item that I couldn't place.

I sighed, disgusted by the results that I had had so far and moved the beam of light over to the chest. Then I stopped, my hand trembling as I stared. A window! Right above the chest was a lovely, square window that was levelled with the ground. "There," I whispered to Pax, who was already making his way towards it.

I followed him immediately, pausing as I came to the chest and looking up at the window. I would have to stand on the chest, but once I was free I could...

What would I do once I was free, I began to wonder. Where am I to go, and what if I'm captured? These Earthlings didn't exactly seem like the "We welcom all" type, considering that I was locked in a basement at the hand of one of them.

"Are you coming?" asked Pax as he fiddled with the latch on the window. It wasn't locked, and he soon had drawn it open. Then he looked back at me, a look of concern spreading through his face. "Liv?"

I shivered and looked down, moving the beam to the chest like I was inspecting it. "You go. I'll be right out."

Pax nodded. "Alright..." He climbed out on his hands and knees. I stared down at the chest for a few more moments, expecting the piece of tape and the characters inked into it that served as a lable, reading "_Mom_".

That word wandered through my head for a few more moments as I tried to decipher the meaning of it. Nothing we had on Irk, that was for sure. I gave a deep before stepping up onto the chest. A mistake, I soon realized, yet at the same time, it was brilliant.

I fell right through the wood, getting attacked by an army of splinters as I landed on my butt with my head sticking out of the chest's newly acquired hole. Pax, looked down, alarmed, but I was laughing.

"I'm alright," I giggled briskly, pushing up on the lid of the unlocked chest to allow myself to stand up. I shuffled around, trying not to crush the objects on the inside, but finding that if it wasn't one thing I was stepping on, it was another much more fragile and/or expensive thing. Finally, I just stopped moving and stared at the mess I had created.

Something about the things in this chest made me uncomfortable and curious. There was a photo under one of my heels of a man with slick black hair holding the hand of a boy which I guessed was a younger version of Dib. Next to him was a woman with pretty purple hair that fell in curls around her face as she smiled into a bundle of pink blankets with a pair of hands reaching out towards the woman. She was hugging the blankets close to a bright red poncho with a low dipping hood that you could see she had just brought down, because it was still cradling some of her hair.

Pax tapped on the glass of the opened window and motioned for me to hurry. I sighed, suddenly brought back to the matters of the real world. I stepped onto the walls of the chest and hauled myself up, then, with the help of me wriggling and Pax dragging me by the antenni, I broke free.

I stood up, but immediatley tripped due to the fact that I wasn't used to walking in these gravtitaional standards, and that something had gotten caught around my heel.

I looked back, and gasped when I saw what it was: The very same cloak that the woman had been wearing in the picture. It must have been in the chest, and I hadn't noticed it getting caught around my heel. But all the same, looking at the hood, I widened my eyes. Finally something had come out lucky for me.

It was growing light as Pax and I ran blindly down yet another alley, trying to devise a plan as to what we could possibly do. Already, we had retraced our steps twice, and I was quickly growing sick of this planet. I kept the hood of the red cloak down to cover my eyes so that someone who looked at me couldn't see my antenni or wide pink eyes, but I could see through the stitching enough to figure out what was in my way. Of course, that didn't assist me in seeing around corners.

I took a sharp turn and smacked full on into somebody else. I was able to keep my footing before I fell to the ground, but they weren't to fortunate. A leash that was attached at one end to a dog flew out of their hand and the landed on their back.

I coughed, trying to clear my throat. "Sorry," I said quickly. I hear Pax skid to a stop just around the corner behind me, trying to stay out of view of the Earthling. "Sorry..."

"Sorry?" asked the kid that I had knocked over. He opened his eyes and lifted his head with a vengeful fire in his eyes, as if he were so proud that even a simple mistake like knocking into him was punishable by death. "I do not except your pitiful human apologies!"

"I…"

"Silence," ordered the kid as he stood back up and reclaimed the leash. He stood as straight as an Irkin soldier, looking at me until I felt like I was under a microscope, and shrinking more by the second. Then he reached his gloved hand over and, before I could step out of the way, pushed me back.

"There," he announced proudly, as if he had just succeeded a great accomplishment. "I am now winner of all and no human can ever…" He stopped, mid-sentence and stared down at me in surprise. I looked back up at him just as hard, feeling a wind weave though my antenni. Wait… how could I be feeling the wind if I had on the…

The poncho's hood had fallen off.

The kid raised a hand and pointed at me in surprise, and I had expected him to shout something like, "Monster!" or "Alien!" or just plain scream. Instead, he said something that caught me totally off guard.

"Irkin!"

**XXXXXX**

**Okay, I'm sorry that there was, like, zero action in this chapter, but I didn't wanna make it too long. Please tell me how you like it, and be honest. If you hate it and think I'm being totally cliche, just come right out with it. Don't keep your thoughts to yourself, because every little piece of advice helps!**

**Oh, and if you're thinking right now that I'm totally going against the description by how Liv feels about Dib at the moment, just remember that this is only the second chapter. Things can change drastically! It all depends on how I feel (like right now, for instance. I have a horrible headache and I want to go read my book, but I HAD to get this out of the way so I can focus on a chapter of another story that my friend, Rainy, is waiting very patiently for...). Anyway, please stick with this story, and don't give up hope on me. If you took the time to read this through, then you are awesome and deserve a hug. Okay, thanks for reading and then listening to me rant about my life in this author's note. **

**Ciao! :D**

**-Journalist793 (Aka, Invader Amy)**


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